Two Hartsville residents win Clemson’s Distinguished Service Award

Published: March 12, 2012

Gosnold G. "Goz" Segars Jr. image by: Clemson University

CLEMSON — The Clemson Alumni Association has recognized Charles Lenson Sullivan Jr. and Gosnold Graham “Goz” Segars Jr., both of Hartsville, as two of its six 2012 winners of the Distinguished Service Award, the association’s highest honor.

Distinguished Service Award honorees demonstrate a dedication to enhancing the value of the university for future generations; church, professional and public service; and personal accomplishments that serve as a model for present and future Clemson students.

Sullivan, ’66, served as a member of the U.S. Army Air Defense Artillery in Korea. He is retired from Sonoco Products, where he was executive vice president and had global operating responsibility for the company’s businesses serving consumer markets. Previously he was with Cargill, an international marketer and processor of agricultural, financial and industrial products, serving as regional director of Cargill Asia/Pacific and president of Cargill’s Salt Division.

He served on the President’s Advisory Council of the Grocery Manufacturers Association and as chairman of the Salt Institute (Virginia) and of Produsal (Venezuela). In 2010, the Gravure Association named him the Gravure Person of the Year.

Currently serving his second term on the Clemson University Foundation board, Sullivan chaired the Development Committee for Corporate Relations and was a member of the national executive committee for the university’s “Will to Lead” capital campaign. He is a lifetime donor to IPTAY and The Clemson Fund and participated in the WestZone initiative. Sullivan was an integral member of the task force that developed the concept and secured the funding for the Sonoco Institute of Packaging Design and Graphics and the Harris Smith Building at Clemson.

Sullivan is past chairman of the Coker College board of trustees and past president of Prestwood Country Club, the YMCA of the Upper Pee Dee and the Hartsville Heritage Foundation. He has served on the board of Harvest Hope Food Bank and the Thomas Hart Academy, and has been chairman of the board of deacons at First Baptist Church of Hartsville and Metropolitan Baptist Church of Wichita, Kansas.

Sullivan and his wife, Betty, have two children.

A 1966 Clemson graduate, Segars heads up the Segars family businesses, which comprises Segars Development, Segars Farms and Segars Realty. He is part owner in an Angus Beef breeding stock business and cattle ranch in Montana.

A former member of Clemson’s Board of Visitors, Segars has been a director of the Clemson University Foundation Board since 2006. He has chaired the investment committee and the investment task group, and is vice chairman of the foundation and a member of its executive committee. A director of the Clemson University Real Estate Foundation, Segars is a founding director of Clemson’s Land Stewardship Foundation. He received Clemson’s 2011 Institutional Advancement Award.

Segars has been heavily involved with Coker College and Florence-Darlington Technical College and served on the Florence Darlington Tec Governing Board for more than 37 years. Currently chairman of Coker College’s board of trustees, he also is a member of the Florence-Darlington Technical College Educational Foundation board of directors, having served two terms as chairman of that college’s board of trustees.

Founding chairman of Forward Darlington County and a member of the Florence Darlington Area Commission, Segars was instrumental in bringing the Southeastern Institute of Manufacturing and Technology (SiMT) to the area. He is lead organizer of Heritage Community Bank and chairman of the board since 1988 and was the founding board chairman of the Hartsville YMCA. He was named Volunteer of the Year in 1999 by both the S.C. Economic Development Association and the State Board of Education. In 2001, Hartsville named him its Citizen of the Year.

A member of Kelleytown Baptist Church in Hartsville, where he was a deacon and Sunday School teacher, Segars is active in Wesley Chapel United Methodist Church in Lydia.

Segars and his wife, Pat, have a family of five children and six grandchildren.

Other Distinguished Service Award winners are William Kelly Durham of Clemson; Theodore G. “Ted” Westmoreland of Shelby, N.C.; E. Smyth McKissick III of Greenville; and Palmer E. “Satch” Krantz of Columbia.

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